Shropshire Star comment: We are about to learn a lot about ourselves

Comparisons have been made to the war, but there is a difference, because during the war people could fight back. Those not in uniform could create the weapons to carry the fight to the enemy by toiling in factories, or could beat the U boats by working in fields to help feed the nation.

Instead of being able to hit back, the Government is asking the population to be on the defensive and devote their efforts to protecting themselves and those around them. We are shrinking away from this particular enemy because science has yet to come up with a vaccine that will turn the tide.

If we think of the supermarkets as being part of the front line, the initial response from some people has been depressing in the light of the challenge we all now face.

Shelves have been emptied of goods such as toilet paper, as people have stockpiled so that they won’t have to do without when the going gets really tough. The other side of that coin is that by feathering their own nests, they are depriving others, who are likely to be among the more vulnerable in our community and less able to make the trip to the supermarket.

During the war there was a fair method of seeing everybody got enough. Rationing was generally accepted and lasted so long it was a way of life well into the 1950s.

According to the Government, there is no problem with the current supply chain, which means the panic buying is illogical and creates a problem when none need exist. However, things are as they are, not as we would like them to be, and supermarkets have been limiting people to how much they can buy of certain goods.

They are also acting creatively to ensure the old and vulnerable have reserved time slots where they have a free run and are effectively segregated for their own safety.

These are early days and in the coming weeks and months we shall face new measures.

We are about to learn a lot about ourselves.

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The present circumstances have taken away the comfort of collective prayer in the Anglican church, which has suspended church services due to the coronavirus outbreak.

With people being told to keep their distance from one another, it was probably inevitable that this would happen. Many members of the normal congregations will be self-isolating in any event.

But it would be a strange sort of Church if this precaution meant an end to the basic tenets of helping others, worship and prayer. It just means the Anglican church will be doing things a little differently for a while.

Much of our area is covered by the Lichfield diocese, and the Bishop of Lichfield says churches will be kept open for private individual prayer as much as possible, and other ideas are being looked at, like the use of social media.

Social distancing measures are seeing a change to traditional Sunday services, but the Church is surely an organisation that should find no difficulty in brushing that aside as an inconvenience. In matters of faith and spirituality, you don’t have to be close together to be close together